Finding Narnia
by Darkened-Storm
Summary: Susan laughed and waved her arms in the snow, "Look, an angel!" she declared. "Looks like a fuzzy Christmas tree to me," Peter teased. To escape the Blitz, two sisters are sent to a house in the country where they discover a magical wardrobe. A long way from home, the two girls must learn the meaning of family if they hope to return to their world - Tie in to LWW
1. The House in the Country

**Finding Narnia**

A Chronicles of Narnia Fanfiction by Darkened-Storm

**Disclaimer:** I, Darkened-Storm, own only my plot, ideas and characters. C.S Lewis owns The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Any characters you do not recognise from his series including Stephanie and Rebecca Pevensie are my creations.

**Note: **This story is a tie-in to the first (/second) book the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and is based around my two OCs, Stephanie and Rebecca Pevensie (you have been warned). I will not be rewriting the entire story (I'm sure you know it already) but just events that are key to my characters. It will be a combination of the books and the movies. This is also my first Narnia fanfiction

**IMPORTANT: Due to an error with the document manager, I uploaded the wrong version of this story (half the chapter was missing) Please accept my sincerest apologies, I will be more careful in future.**

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**Chapter One: The House in The Country**

The year was 1940 and London was in the midst of the Second World War. Two sisters, Stephanie and Rebecca were sent away to stay with their cousins at the home of an old Professor named Digory Kirke, who was a distant relative of their aunts. They were sent away because the German air raids on the city made London a very unpleasant place to live. Professor Kirke lived in a very old mansion (older than the Professor himself) in the heart of the country, ten miles from the nearest railway station and two miles from the nearest Post Office.

Now most children would be excited to be sent away to an exciting house in the country, but Stephanie and Rebecca were as miserable as two little girls could be. They were waiting on a wooden bench at a country station called Combe Halt to be collected by the Professor's housekeeper, Mrs Macready. Already they had been away from their home in Kingston for half a day and already they missed their mother and their father had been away for so long that Rebecca, who was the youngest of the two, could hardly remember what he looked like.

"Cheer up, Becks," Steph said. "I'm sure we'll have lots of fun with our cousins – you remember Susan and Lucy, you had such a fun time with them when they came to stay last summer."

She might as well have been talking to a wall for all the response she got from her little sister - at least walls didn't pull faces at you. Steph tried not to take it personally and told herself that her sister was just upset about the whole situation.

It wasn't, Steph decided, the worst place they could be in. When the war had first began, Steph had overheard her mother and father discussing whether they would send both girls to live with their Aunt Alberta and Uncle Harold in Cambridge. Alberta and Harold had one son, Eustace Clarence Scrubb, who neither of the girls liked very well so Steph had been understandably relieved to hear they would instead be sent to stay with their cousins from Finchley instead.

She liked Susan and got along well with her in school (both girls attended St Finbars throughout the school year) and she adored the youngest. Susan and Lucy had two brothers who would be coming to stay with the Professor as well. Peter was the oldest, having turned thirteen last Spring (Steph would be turning thirteen at the end of Autumn). Susan was twelve, a year younger than Peter, and nine months older than Becky, who was eleven. Edmund, the other brother was ten years old and Lucy was only eight.

At the moment, however, Steph was beginning to wonder if the Professor had forgotten they were coming when a small carriage pulled up before the station, pulled by a large white mare. A very stern looking woman sat in the carriage and peered down at them over her spectacles. Steph got the feeling she wasn't the sort of woman to cross. "Mrs Macready?" she asked uncertainly.

"I'm afraid so," the woman answered and opened the carriage door for them to get in. She frowned at their small collection of belongings as they climbed into the carriage together and sat down. When they were settled, Macready tapped the horse pulling the carriage twice and they were off.

It was a long trip from Combe Halt station to the Professor's house. Becky fell asleep after a while and Steph nudged her awake when the house came into sight.

"There are rules," the Macready said as she led them through the house and up the stairs. "No running, no shouting – no touching the historical artefacts (Becky immediately pulled her hand back from the statue at the top of the stairs) – and above all, no disturbing of the Professor."

She led them to a bedroom on the third floor and opened the two. "Put your bags in there and come and join the Professor for dinner. The meal will be served in fifteen minutes and you are not to be late."

Wordlessly, the two girls shuffled into the room with their bags and put them down on the wooden floor. Becky went to the window and muttered; "we're stuck in the middle of nowhere."

"It's not so bad," Steph said, looking around, "there's books and a wireless – we can listen to our favourite radio programmes." She didn't even need to look at her sister to know Becky wasn't impressed, but there wasn't much either of them could do about it.

"Look, it's just until the war is over – then we can go back home again."

"Do you know how long wars go for?" Becky snapped back. "Mother said the last war with Germany lasted four years."

Steph didn't know what to say to that, so she didn't say anything at all. They unpacked some of their things in relative silence and put them in the wardrobes, then washed up for dinner.

"Oh bother," Steph muttered as soon as she stepped out of the room and realised she didn't know the way back to the Dining room.

"You're lost, aren't you?" Becky said after Steph had walked up and down the passage a third time.

"Just give me a minute," Steph muttered, retracing her steps to the end of the corridor and down a set of stairs she thought she recognised. By the time they reached the Dining room they were very, very late. Dinner had already been served and the Professor sat at the head of the table. Their cousins, Susan and Lucy sat on one side of him, and Peter and Edmund on the other.

"I'm so sorry Professor Kirke," Steph said. "We got lost." She heard Becky shift nervously behind her and felt felt the Macready's scrutinising eyes on her from across the table.

"I warned them not to be late, Professor," the Macready said sternly. The Professor waved his hand.

"That's all right, Mrs Macready – the house is very large after all. Come and sit down with your cousins." He smiled delightedly as Becky pulled out the chair beside Lucy and sat down. Steph sat down beside Edmund, who'd grown much taller than when she'd last seen him.

"That's the way," the Professor said. "Now, eat up and let's all get to know one another. Peter, do tell me what form you're in at school."

"Third form, Professor," Peter answered.

"Excellent, excellent, and what subjects do you study?"

The conversation continued that way throughout dinner. It was a very delicious dinner, better than anything any of them had ever tasted. The Professor asked each of the children in turn what class they were in, and which were their favourite subjects and what after-school activities they did.

"I have quite a large library upstairs, full of wonderful books," he told Steph, when she said that she liked to read. "You may borrow some of them if you like." To the boys he said; "There's a lake outside that's wonderful for fishing. I daresay I've never caught anything in my time, but you may have better luck than I."

After dinner, the girls sat together on Lucy and Susan's bed and listened to the wireless. There wasn't much talking because Lucy, Becky and Susan were all too miserable to talk and Steph didn't really know what to say to Peter. She had never been very good at talking to boys – especially Peter. She might have tried talking to Edmund except that after dinner Peter had sent him to get ready for bed and he hadn't come back yet.

"The sheets feel scratchy," she said sadly. Becky patted her hair and Peter came over to sit on the edge of his sister's bed.

"Wars don't last forever, Lucy," Susan said kindly. "We'll be home soon."

"If home is still there," Edmund said pointedly as he joined them in the room, dressed in his pyjamas and dressing gown. He was tired, and pretending not to be, which only made him grumpier.

Susan scowled. "Isn't it time you were in bed?" she said.

"Yes, _Mum_," Edmund said in a mocking tone.

"Ed!" Peter said, giving his brother a nasty look. Edmund muttered something under his breath that none of them heard quite clearly and shuffled off back to his room. The damage was done though, and Lucy was looking even more upset than before.

"Is he always so nasty?" Becky asked and patted Lucy's hair again.

"No," Peter said, still miffed. "Just most of the time. Leave him be and he'll go to bed."

"Shouldn't we all go to bed?" Steph said, "it's late and we'll be told off if we're heard talking here?"

"We won't be heard," Peter said. "It's about a ten minute walk from here to that dining room and any number of stairs and passages in between. I daresay this is the sort of place where no one is going to care much what we do."

"As long as we keep away from the Macready," Becky said with a scowl.

"Perhaps we should go outside then," Susan suggested. "There's bound to be lots of fascinating creatures out there, like badgers and eagles."

"Do you think there'll be rabbits like Albert?" Becky asked hopefully. Albert had been the pet rabbit Becky and Steph had had in their yard back in London.

"Not exactly like Albert," Steph said. "He was a white rabbit and they don't have them in the wild."

"But there will be rabbits?" Lucy pressed on excitedly.

"I guess so," Steph said. She wasn't entirely sure what kind of animals lived in this part of the country. "We can spend the day exploring and see."

Peter looked satisfied with this plan. "See Lu," he said. "Tomorrow's going to be great, really."

"We won't be any good for exploring if we don't get some sleep," Susan said, giving Peter a gentle nudge. "Off to bed with you," she said, shooing her brother off the bed.

"All right, I'm going," Peter said, getting off the bed. "Don't stay up all night chatting," he warned them with a grin, and they promised they wouldn't.

Steph helped Susan fix the over Becky and Lucy. They'd originally intended for Susan to share the double bed with Lucy and Steph would take the bed next to the window so that Becky could take the bed by the door because she often made more than one trip to the bathroom each night.

"No point moving you two now," Steph decided, because they both looked comfortable and content cuddled up together. Susan didn't seem to mind either and took the bed by the door, leaving Steph the one by the window.

"Will you read to us?" Becky asked hopefully.

Becky hadn't asked to be read to since before the war began. It wasn't long after the Germans had declared war on England that Steph noticed her little sister's behaviour begin to change. She acted very proper now, like their mother, but sitting on Lucy's bed, her arms wrapped tightly around the younger girl's waist, Becky looked much younger than she had when they'd left Kingston. Perhaps it was a combination of being sent away from home and having Lucy around that made Becky feel as though she could be an eleven year old girl again.

"What book would you like?" Steph asked at last, and Lucy's face lit up with excitement.

"Oh, will you read Peter Pan to us," she said at once. "That's my favourite!"

"Only because our brother's name is Peter," said Susan, and she seemed almost embarrassed. "Pick another story, Lu."

"But I like that one too," Becky said. She got up from the bed to fetch the book and placed it eagerly in Steph's hands. "Go on, read it already."

Steph laughed, sat back down on the bed and opened the book as Becky crawled back under the covers. Lucy clasped her hand and waited eagerly for her to begin. "All children, except one, grow up..."

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Lucy only lasted a few pages, and Becky not much longer after that. By the time Steph was onto the second chapter, both girls were sound asleep. She tucked them both under the covers and went back to her own bed to finish reading when Peter peered into the room.

He saw her sitting up in bed and smiled awkwardly, then crossed the room to Susan's bed, where she had fallen asleep with her own book on the covers. He took the book, folded the corner of one page to mark where Susan was up to and placed it on her nightstand before Steph understood what he was doing.

"Checking up on us?" she teased.

"Not at all," Peter said, and then he looked sheepish. "Well, maybe," he admitted. He motioned to the book in her hands. "Night-time reading?" he asked.

"Lucy requested it."

"I'll let you get back to it then," he said.

He tucked the covers over Susan and fixed the sheets Becky had already kicked off in her sleep. He checked on Lucy last, pulling the sheets up to her chin. He lingered for a moment, watching her sleep and Steph got the impression that of his three siblings, Lucy was Peter's favourite.

When he was certain all three girls were fast asleep he crept to the window by the wireless and switched it on very low. Steph never knew how long he sat there, listening to the reports on the war and wondering (or dreading) if he'd hear the words Finchley or Kingston – she fell asleep after a few moments, lulled by the soft voices over the wireless. She never even noticed Peter fold her book closed and place it on the night stand before turning out the light.

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**My first Narnia fanfiction. A review is not required, but would be much appreciated. Also, I am looking for a beta reader if anyone is interested.**


	2. Cousin Lucy's Magical Land

**Finding Narnia**

A Chronicles of Narnia Fanfiction by Darkened-Storm

**Disclaimer:** I, Darkened-Storm, own only my plot, ideas and characters. C.S Lewis owns The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Any characters you do not recognise from his series, including Stephanie and Rebecca Pevensie, are my creations.

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**Chapter 2: Cousin Lucy's Magical Land**

When the next morning came there was a steady rain falling so instead of exploring outside, the children sat in the sitting room the Professor had set aside for them and Susan made a game of asking them the meaning of different words in a dictionary Steph had found in the Professor's library.

It wasn't a fun game and the expression on Edmund's face was enough to convey his disapproval, whether it was because he found the game dull of because he didn't know as many words as the older children, Steph didn't know. They gave Lucy easier words to guess.

"Gastrovascular," Susan sounded out the word for them to define. It was Peter's turn to guess, but he had long since lost interest in the game and was staring out at the rain lashed window.

Steph nudged Peter with her foot. He turned away from the window to roll his eyes at both of them. "Is it Latin?" he asked.

"Yes," Susan said.

From beneath one of the wooden sitting chairs, Edmund said. "Is it Latin for worst game ever invented?" he asked his sister.

Susan gave an annoyed sigh, slammed the book shut and glared at her two brothers, both of whom were grinning broadly.

"It's an adjective," Steph said. Before the war, her father had been a doctor in a hospital and she knew the word from reading it in one of the anatomy books he father kept at home. "It's used to describe an organism having both a digestive and a circulatory system."

Susan smiled at her appreciatively but Edmund rolled his eyes. "This is such a bore," he said.

Lucy came over to sit by Peter. "We could play Hide and Seek," she suggested.

"Hide and seek is a kids game," Edmund said nastily from the floor.

"It's the perfect game for you then," Becky said. After last night, she didn't very much like Edmund at all and her favourite way to deal with people she didn't like was to be just as mean to them as they were to other people.

"Be nice, both of you," Steph warned them before they could get into a fight. Earlier that morning, Edmund had gotten into a disagreement with Becky over something he'd said to Lucy. Steph had tried to give Edmund the benefit of the doubt, much to Becky's chagrin, but she'd noticed Edmund was always twice as nasty to Lucy as he was to anyone else.

"Edmund can be a bit troublesome," had been Susan's only explanation when Steph had asked but she had later heard from Lucy (who was too young to know any better) that Edmund hadn't been himself since he'd gone away to school last year. Peter on the other hand, was very good with Lucy and often gave in to her to keep her happy.

"Come on Peter, please," Lucy said, tugging on his arm until he got off the chair and began to count. "One, two, three…"

It was impossible, Steph thought, for anyone to deny Lucy something she wanted and she wasn't the least bit surprised when Peter got up from the chair and began to count. "One, two, three…"

Lucy's face lit up with delight and she scampered out of the room to hide. Edmund looked thoroughly annoyed but jumped to his feet and ran away to hide when Peter reached "eleven" and one by one, they all went off to hide.

Susan chose to hide in an old wooden chest in one of the many hallways. Steph passed her on the way to the library, where she thought to hide amongst the shelves, but then reasoned to herself that Peter would look for her there first and instead crawled into a small cupboard under a staircase not far from where Susan was hiding.

It would have been smarter, Steph thought, as she squeezed into the space, to hide somewhere away from the other children and make it harder for Peter to find them all, but then she didn't want to bump into the Macready on her way, who would surely disapprove of Lucy's game.

Just when she had squeezed as far back into the cupboard as she could manage, the cupboard door opened again and Steph thought she had been found, but it was only Becky, who said; "move over" and squeezed in beside her.

"Ouch, you're on my foot!" Steph exclaimed.

"Shh! He's coming," Becky hissed and they both fell silent.

Sure enough, a short while later they heard the unmistakable sound of Peter's footsteps coming down the hallway and the opening and closing of doors and the rustle of curtains as he searched for his family. Then Steph heard Lucy's voice shouting from one of the spare rooms.

"It's all right! I'm back, I'm all right!"

Edmund said something, his soft voice muffled by the door and then Peter, in a much louder voice, said to them both; "you know, I'm not sure you two have quite got the idea of this game."

Giving the game up for lost, Steph clambered out of the cupboard, ignoring Becky's protests. Peter, Edmund and Lucy were standing in the corridor. Edmund was glaring at his little sister, annoyed that he'd been lured out of his hiding spot by his red-faced little sister. Lucy herself was shivering and she looked as though she'd been out in the snow in mid-winter.

Peter looked helplessly from one to the other, clearly wondering what was going on.

"You know, this is the strangest game of Hide and Seek I've ever played," Steph told, earning an eye roll from the older boy.

"Haven't you been wondering where I was?" Lucy asked them.

"That's the point," Edmund told her impatiently, drawing out his words as though Lucy was five years old. "That's why he was seeking you!"

"Does this mean I win?" The commotion had drawn Susan out of her hiding spot and she was delighted to see them all there. Her grin faded when she saw Lucy looking red-faced and frowned.

Peter turned to his sister. "I don't think Lucy wants to play anymore," he told her.

"I've been gone for hours," Lucy said and Steph could see she was getting frustrated.

"Batty," said Edmund, tapping his head. "Quite batty." Becky stomped on his toe and he fell quite.

"Don't be silly, Lucy," Susan said, but Steph, who had made up a lot of stories and imaginary lands to keep her sister entertained over the summer holidays had an idea of what Lucy was doing. "She's just making the story up for fun, aren't you Lu?"

"No, I'm not," Lucy said, very seriously. "It's a magic wardrobe, with a wood inside and a faun called Mr Tumnas and an evil Witch. Come and see, I'll show you."

There was nothing to do except to follow her and she led them upstairs to the third floor, passed a lock door none of them had been able to open, to the spare room. She turned the knob and went inside. Steph gave Peter a puzzled look, wondering if they should go in. With a shrug of his shoulders, Peter led the way in, holding the door open for his family.

The room itself was empty, save for a dead blue bottle on the windowsill and a very big wardrobe; the sort that has a looking glass in the door. Lucy marched right up to the wardrobe, pulled open the door and said; "see for yourselves!"

Susan leaned into the wardrobe and pulled the coats apart. They watched her knock once on the back of it. Someone knocked on the other side, giving them all a fright until Becky pulled Edmund out from behind the wardrobe and they all realised it was him who had knocked back.

"Funny, aren't you," Becky said with a scowl and wrapped him over the head lightly with her knuckles.

"Ow," he exclaimed, fending her off and rubbing his head. "It was just a joke."

Peter fixed his brother with a disapproving look before they all turned back to the wardrobe and Lucy, who was standing beside the door, looking as surprised as the rest of them.

"Lucy, the only wood in here is the back of the wardrobe," Susan said at last.

Steph peered into the wardrobe, and sure enough, it was just an ordinary wardrobe, with a bunch of coats hanging inside. "It certainly does look ordinary," she decided. She didn't want to mention that, for a moment, she'd almost believed Lucy. Really – a magical land inside a wardrobe? What had she been thinking?

From the look on Peter's face, she could tell she wasn't the only one who'd almost believed Lucy. "One game at a time, Lu," he told her. "We don't all have your imagination." He turned away from the wardrobe and ushered his brother and sister out of the room. Susan Becky took a quick glance inside the wardrobe again, shrugged her shoulders and followed.

"Come on, Lu," Steph said, trailing after them, but Lucy remained where she was, her face turning from pale to a bright tomato colour.

"But I wasn't imagining!" she cried, much louder than was acceptable indoors and Steph hoped the Macready hadn't heard.

Susan turned around and said, very crossly; "that's enough, Lucy."

"I wouldn't lie about this," Lucy insisted.

"Well I believe you," Edmund said at once, and they all turned to look at him. He grinned nastily. "Didn't I tell you about the football field I found in the bathroom cupboard?"

Peter rounded on his brother. "You have to make everything worse, don't you?" he told Edmund.

Edmund looked indignant. "It was just a joke."

Peter scowled at him. "When are you going to learn to grow up?"

"Shut up," Edmund said at once, and he was yelling now. "You think you're Dad, but you're not!"

"Well that was nicely handled," Susan said scornfully and went after her younger brother. Steph gave Peter a reproachful look, which he ignored and rounded on his little sister.

"But it really was there," Lucy insisted again. She looked as though she was about to cry.

"Susan's right, Lucy," Peter told her. "That's enough." He turned and left the room, heading in the opposite direction to Edmund and Susan.

"Peter!" Steph called, hurrying after him and leaving Becky to deal with Lucy. She only caught up with him when he reached the end of the hall and fixed him with the most unimpressed look she could manage. She took a moment to catch her breath, then said; "There's no need to tell Edmund off like that, he was only joking."

Peter sighed, looking remorseful. "I suppose I could have handled that a bit better," he admitted.

"You didn't handle it at all Peter, you just yelled at him," she told him bluntly. "You're not going to win any points with Edmund if you treat him like that."

"He needed to be told," Peter said.

"Yes," she agreed. "But you haven't done yourself any favours getting him all upset up like that – in fact you've probably made him even angrier at you."

She didn't mean to sound mad at him - she knew he was trying to help them, just as she was trying to help her sister, but he was going about it the wrong way. "You're not their father, Peter," she told him quietly.

Peter shifted, his expression growing dark. "No," he agreed coolly. "But I'm the best they're got."

The next few days in the Professor's house were some of the worst summer holidays Steph had ever spent. The weather was still quite terrible, but none of them dared to mention playing Hide and Seek again so they found other things to do inside the house. Peter and Edmund found a long room on the third floor with a suit of armour in it and spent a lot of their time wondering if they could take it apart and put it back together again. Becky and Susan played indoor games such as "I Spy".

During these raining days, Steph spent most of her time in the library or the sitting room reading some of the Professor's books. She was incredibly intelligent for her age and loved to read books - books with stories about a boy and his talking bear, stories about a genie in a lamp and a wicked witch with a magic mirror. Each night, she would pick a different book to read to Becky and Lucy.

Four days into her stay at the Professor's house, Steph was on her way back down to the library to replace some of the books when she heard a muffled sobbing coming from the room adjacent to the sitting room.

"Lu?" she called, peering into the room. "Is that you in there?"

Lucy was curled up on the sofa. She was red in the face and her eyes were quite puffy. The poor girl had been a miserable sight around the house since her so called adventure in the wardrobe, and the situation was only made worse by Edmund, who Steph was quickly coming to realised could be a nasty little boy when he wanted to be, and for that reason in itself she was infinitely glad she did not have and brothers.

Edmund never teased Lucy when the older children were around - Peter was always quick to tell him off and Becky was twice as nasty to him in return - but they could tell the bullying was still going on behind their backs because Lucy would disappear for ages before coming back and they could tell she had been crying.

"Lucy," Steph said, sitting on the sofa next to Lucy. It took her a few tries to coax Lucy from her balled up position on the sofa and when she did, the younger girl climbed into her lap and rested her head on Steph's shoulder.

"Lu, what's the matter?"

Lucy dabbed at her eyes with her sleeves. "Everyone thinks I'm lying – I know they do even though they don't say anything. Edmund keeps asking me if I found any more countries inside the closets."

Steph scowled, cursing Edmund in her head. "I wouldn't pay any attention to him, Lu," she told her cousin. "If you ignore him he'll give up on it eventually."

Lucy nodded, looking a little better. "Do you believe me?"

Steph shook her head. "I believe you when you say you're not lying," she said. "But, Lu, I think it's more likely that you imagined it – or maybe it was a dream."

"I wasn't dreaming," Lucy insisted. "I remember we were playing Hide and Seek. I couldn't find anywhere else to hide in the room, so I got into the wardrobe. I remember thinking that it would take forever for Peter to find me amongst all the coats and mothballs when I felt something wet under my feet.

"It was snow, and when I turned around, I was in a white forest and I met a faun there, his name was Mr Tumnas. He invited me back to his cave for tea and played me a Narnian lullaby.

"I must have fallen asleep, because the next thing I remember is poor old Mr Tumnas. He was crying and said that he'd have to hand me over to the White Witch – she's the one who made it always winter but never Christmas. But then he said he'd help me escape and took me back to the wardrobe.

"And then I climbed out of the wardrobe, and Peter had just finished counting – which is weird because I could have sworn I was gone for hours, like I said. I can't have just dreamed that all up could I? It must have been real."

"Peter, Susan and I all looked in the wardrobe and there was nothing there but a bunch of coats, Lu. No forest, just coats," Steph said. "How can something be real if we can't see it?"

Lucy had an answer for this. "Maybe you can't see it because you don't believe," she said simply.

After dinner that night, Steph pulled Edmund aside. "What did you say to Lucy?" she asked him.

Edmund, who had never managed to be quite as rude to her as he was to Peter or Susan, but still rude enough, scowled at her and tried to wriggle free, but she'd caught him by the scruff of his shirt and didn't let go.

"I didn't say anything that wasn't true," Edmund said angrily. "If Lucy would just stop telling lies then I wouldn't have anything to tease her about." He had a nasty expression on his face and didn't seem in the least bit sorry – in fact, Steph rather thought he looked like he was proud of it!

"You know something Edmund," she said coolly, "nasty little boys such as yourselves always get their just deserts."

She let him go, satisfied that he'd spend the rest of the night trying to figure out what 'just deserts' were. She didn't think it would stop him from teasing Lucy altogether, but she hoped it would at least make him think twice about it.

Edmund wasn't the biggest problem Lucy faced however. As much as she didn't want to get Lucy in any more trouble, she couldn't not tell Peter and Susan about the faun and the witch. She was amazed that someone as young as Lucy could create such a complex world in her mind but Susan and Peter were beginning to think Lucy was out of her mind.

As much as Steph knew that Lucy's Narnia couldn't be real, she couldn't shake the feeling that there was something more to the wardrobe than they'd seen. Unable to contain her curiosity, she went up to the Wardrobe Room after Lucy and the others had gone to bed to have another look at the wardrobe.

It was the finest wardrobe that Steph had ever seen. The wood was perfectly even across the entire wardrobe and pictures had been carefully engraved in the panels. The first depicted an apple and on the panel opposite there was an etching of two rings. In the two corners of the wardrobe was a lion's face. On the door of the wardrobe itself, there were three etchings. The first was of a crown surrounded by branches, and the second was of a tree – Steph thought it looked very similar to an apple tree. The last etching depicted a sun rising over an ocean.

It was magnificent – magical even, Steph decided, running her hands across the wood and stopping when her hand rested just above the doorknob. She hesitated, then turned the knob and pulled the door open.

She parted the coats as Susan had done before and peered into the wardrobe and half hoped to see the trees and snow Lucy had described.

All she found was the back of the wardrobe. She knocked on the wood once, twice, then looked around between the coats. She tapped the floor, wondering if perhaps it had a false bottom, but found only solid wood.

Chastising herself for being so silly, she shut the door and glared at the wardrobe for a long moment before she turned on her heel, stormed out of the room and walked right into Peter, who was going the other way.

"Sorry," she muttered.

"No it was my fault," Peter said apologetically. "I didn't think anyone was up here." She was glad to see he wasn't still mad at her for what she'd said earlier. He looked up and down the hallway, as though he was wondering where she had come from, and saw the open door. "Were you … did you just come out of the Wardrobe Room?" he asked her.

There was no point lying. The door to the Wardrobe Room was the only unlocked door in this wing of the house. "Yes. I – I just wanted to have a look for myself… make sure there really wasn't a magical land in there."

She felt like an idiot. Peter probably thought she was an idiot, but to her surprise, he just smiled. "It would be something, wouldn't it?" he said wistfully. "I'd imagine any world in there would be a whole lot better than ours right about now."

"Maybe that's why Lu made it up," Steph suggested.

"Well, I've never known Lucy to lie like that. She is always so honest, and the way she insisted it was there, it was almost as though …"

"As though she really believed it was there," Steph finished for him.

Peter nodded, an uneasy expression on his face. "That's what worries me," he said.

"We should talk to the Professor about it," Steph suggested. She didn't like the idea that Lucy might be going mad – but well, she knew war could do all sorts of things to people.

Peter nodded his head in agreement. "He'll write to father if he thinks there's something really wrong with Lu," he said; "it's getting beyond us."

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I am not nearly as happy with this chapter as I should be - truth was the only good scenes I had were Steph's scene with Peter and her exploring the wardrobe, but I had already written the other scenes so I thought it would be a shame not to include them.

I am also still looking for a** beta-reader **for this fic if anyone is interested.

I also am opening this fic up to you readers to** have some of your own OCs included -** I am looking for** Talking Animals/Dwarves/Centaurs** to include in this fic and my upcoming fic so just let me know in a review or a PM if you have any characters I could borrow =)** I will give you full credit for them of course. **

**As always, thanks for reading and please review =)**


	3. A Lesson in Logic

**Finding Narnia**

A Chronicles of Narnia Fanfiction by Darkened-Storm

**Disclaimer:** I, Darkened-Storm, own only my plot, ideas and characters. C.S Lewis owns The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Any characters you do not recognise from his series, including Stephanie and Rebecca Pevensie, are my creations.

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**IMPORTANT NOTICE: **Since I plan to be writing a lot of Narnia Fanfiction in the future, I had created a section for it on my blog, so if you want to read more about my upcoming series you can head to my blog (my FFN profile has the link) - at the moment its got a** timeline** and some **sketches** of Steph and Becky drawn by the wonderful Strayberry-Liger and some **character profiles** for the girls as well** - **I update that pretty regularly too and will put **snippets of upcoming chapters** on there so you can read them there first before I updat**e - check it out in your spare time and I hope you enjoy this update.**

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**Chapter Three: A Lesson in Logic**

That night they were all woken by Lucy's excited squeals coming from the boys' room. Steph sat up, feeling around in the dark for my nightgown until Becky, who's bed was closest to the light switch had the sense to turn on the light.

"What's going on?" Becky mumbled, stifling a yawn.

"Lucy," Susan said at once, looking from Lucy's empty bed to the door. She pulled on her dressing gown and hurried into the boy's room. Blinking sleep from her eyes, Steph stumbled out of bed and stuffed her hands into the arms of her dressing gown and shoved her feet into her slippers. She almost walked right into Becky as they both stumbled in the hall where Edmund was waiting silently.

"Edmund, you look horrible," Becky said.

Horrible was an understatement, Steph decided as she looked Edmund up and down. His pale skin looked even pastier than usual and had a slight green hue to it. He looked as though he might be sick if he tried to speak.

"Are you all right, Edmund," she asked. He nodded numbly and his teeth chattered.

"Come on, let's get you back to bed," she said, putting an arm around his shoulder. He didn't shy away as she expected him to do, but rather he leaned into her so that he was almost hugging her. Surprised, she hugged him back and helped him into the room, where Susan and Lucy were arguing. Peter sat helplessly between them.

"Oh, you've just been dreaming Lucy," Susan said, exasperated.

"But I haven't!" Lucy exclaimed. "I saw Mr. Tumnus again, and this time Edmund went too!"

What little colour had remained in Edmund's face up until now drained away as they all turned to look at him. Peter looked the most surprised of all of them. "You saw the faun?" he asked.

Edmund shook his head.

Lucy got up off her brother's bed, not looking quite as excited as before. "He didn't actually go there with me," she admitted. She must have thought of something then because she turned around and looked at Edmund suspiciously (well, as suspiciously as an eight year old could).

"What were you doing Edmund?" she asked him.

Edmund shifted uncomfortably on the spot and Steph thought he looked as though he was trying to come up with something to say. "I was just playing along," he said, suddenly looking very apologetic. "I'm sorry Peter, I shouldn't have encouraged her but you know what little children are like these days; they just don't know when to stop pretending."

The corner of his lips twitched upwards as he fixed his sister with the superior look he usually had when talking down to Lucy, only this time it wasn't quite right as though he wasn't as sure of himself as he usually was.

Lucy's face turned from pale to a wicked red colour and she began to sob. Glaring at her brother through tearful eyes, she ran from the room almost tripping on her dressing gown as she went.

Susan shot her brother a disapproving look before going after her sister and Becky, looking as though she wanted to throttle Edmund, went after them both, muttering under her breath about 'beastly boys'.

Neither of their reactions was on par with Peter's however. The oldest Pevensie looked positively infuriated as he got out of bed and snatched up his dressing gown and tugged it on. He shoved Edmund as roughly as he could as he passed and the younger boy fell back on his bed.

"Ow!" Edmund exclaimed, though he wasn't really hurt, and Peter was already too far down the hall to hear him.

Steph looked at Edmund feeling not the least bit sorry for him. "You can't say you didn't deserve that," she told him coldly. "Why did you have to go and upset Lucy again? Can't you see she's already having a hard time of it?"

Her words stunned him, but she was beyond caring for whatever Edmund had to say for himself and left the room without so much as a backward glance.

She was angry at herself for having been fooled earlier into worrying about him. She knew now that Edmund had only looked so ill because he knew he was about to be told off by Peter again for upsetting Lucy. She was going to have a good word to Peter about his brother's behaviour. _And if that doesn't help I'll go to the Professor,_ she decided.

She rounded the corner after her cousins and walked straight into Peter so suddenly that she almost fell down. He shot her an anxious look and she saw Lucy further down the hall with the Professor. All the commotion had woken the Macready as well, and she was looking quite furious. "You children are one shenanigan shy of sleeping in the stable!" she exclaimed.

"That's all right Mrs Macready, I'm sure there's an explanation," the Professor said, "but I think this one is in need of a little hot chocolate." He handed Lucy over and she followed Macready down the hallway towards the kitchens.

Quietly, Peter tugged on Susan and Steph's robes and motioned for them to go back to their rooms. Susan turned at once and Steph grabbed Becky by her nightgown. They were only two steps down the hall when the Professor cleared his throat and they all turned around, quite certain they were all in trouble.

"Now, about that explanation," he said, and Steph was relieved to see he didn't look half as angry with them as she'd expected him to. He brought them into his office and Susan began to tell the Professor all about Lucy's magical land inside the wardrobe and how Edmund had begun making fun of her and how the older children were beginning to worry that Lucy was going rather mad.

"She's not mad, my dears," the Professor told them wisely. "One only has to look at her and talk to her to see that."

"You're not saying you believe her?" Peter said at once.

The Professor raised an eyebrow at them. "You don't?" he asked them.

The four of them exchanged confused looks. This was not how they had expected a grown man of the Professors age to talk and because they had all been certain Lucy was making things up.

Finally, Susan said; "of course not. I mean, logically it's impossible."

The Professor fiddled with his pipe, frowning to himself. "What do they teach in schools these days?" he wondered. When none of them had an answer for him he lit hit pipe and put it in his mouth. "If she's not mad, and she's not lying, then _logically_ we must assume she is telling the truth," he told them.

"You're saying that we should just believe her?" asked Peter.

"She's your sister isn't she? You're her family," the Professor insisted; "you might just try acting like it."

"Professor, sir," Steph said quietly. "I was thinking that just maybe all this talk of the war has gotten to Lucy's head." She looked meaningfully at Peter, who nodded agreeably. "Perhaps she simply made this place up in the wardrobe to get away from it all."

"Yes," Becky said at once, "or maybe Lucy is just a little bit lonely. Oh, Professor, is there maybe something we can do to help Lu?"

"My dear young lady," said the Professor. "There is one thing we haven't thought to try yet."

"What's that?" Becky asked.

The Professor looked at them all very sharply over his spectacles. "We might all try minding our own business." And that was the end of the conversation, for he sent them all off to bed after that.

By the time they returned to their rooms, feeling just as confused as each other, Lucy was back in bed holding a cup of hot chocolate. The warm drink seemed to have done the trick, because she looked a little better than before. Susan took the cup and placed it on the bed side table and Becky tucked Lucy under the sheets before getting under her own.

Steph and Peter didn't feel the least bit tired, however. Their meeting with the Professor had given them a lot to think about and together they went down to the kitchens to discuss it over a hot chocolate. They were surprised to see Edmund there and when he saw them both, Edmund leaped up off the chair and made for his room, but Peter caught him by the back of his night gown.

"Now look here," Peter said savagely. "You've been quite beastly to Lu ever since she started this wardrobe nonsense, and now you go playing games with her and setting her off again."

"But it's all nonsense," Edmund said.

"We know it's all nonsense." Steph told him, crossing her arms over her chest. "The problem is Lucy doesn't think it is and now the Professor says we ought to leave her well enough alone – and that means not giving her a hard time about it."

"I thought – " Edmund began.

"You didn't think at all," Peter said, "you were just being spiteful. You've always liked being beastly to anyone smaller than you; we've seen that at school before now."

Edmund screwed up her face and muttered something horrible under his breath that Steph didn't quite catch, but that made Peter say; "Get to bed Edmund, and if I hear you've been saying nasty things to Lucy again I'll be writing to Father about your behaviour."

Edmund went back to his room without another word. They heard his footsteps as he stomped up the stairs in a huff and Peter heaved a heavy sigh and sank into Edmund's abandoned chair.

Quietly so as not to disturb the Macready again, Steph went to the cupboard to fix them both a hot chocolate. She spooned some cocoa into mugs and added water from the kettle. It was still warm from Lucy's cup earlier. She stirred them both, taking some of her frustration out on the spoon as she stirred.

She had been terribly mad at Edmund for what he'd done, but telling him off for it didn't make her feel any better at all and it seemed Peter felt a thousand times worse than she did. The whole situation was a big mess, and Steph felt partly responsible for it.

"I'm sorry, Peter," she said, handing him a mug and sitting on the stool next to his. "I think I only encouraged Lucy with those books."

Peter shook his head. "It's not your fault," he said. "You didn't know she would start up this wardrobe drivel again and drag us all from our beds. I don't know where she got the idea for this nonsense with the wardrobe, but it's getting a bit beyond me."

"Lucy's been upset since we got here," Steph reminded him, "maybe this is just her way of handling it. Look here a minute," she said, when Peter looked as though he was going to interrupt. "When we were little we used to make up all sorts of stories and adventures together and I know Lucy's a bit old for that now, but maybe Lucy wants this 'Narnia' to be real more than anything because it's a safer place than the real world is right now."

He looked troubled by this. "What can we do for her then?" he wondered.

"Perhaps we should just mind our business, like the Professor said." The expression on his face told her Peter would rather do anything else to help Lucy, but at this point, all four older children were beyond themselves. And then there was the problem of Edmund, who was bound to be twice as horrible to both of them tomorrow.

Silence fell between them and Steph took a long sip of her hot chocolate. The liquid was warm against her throat and made her feel a little better.

"It's not easy, is it?" Peter said suddenly, staring into his own cup, "trying to be the grown up."

"No," Steph admitted sadly, "it isn't."

"I wish Father was here," he said earnestly. "He was wonderful with Lu, and Edmund too. I promised him that I'd help Mother take care of them when he left, but all I've managed to do is make things worse."

"You do the best you can," Steph told him. "And you do far better than I do. I don't know that I'd handle Edmund half as well as you do."

Peter smiled appreciatively. "You do all right too, you know," he said. "You've been absolutely wonderful with Lucy these past few days. I think Becky is very lucky to have you for a sister."

Steph smiled gratefully and drank some more of her chocolate while Peter went on telling her what he thought they might do tomorrow. Steph was eager to try her hand at cricket, which she'd watched Edmund and Peter play a few days earlier and Peter promised to teach her and Becky. When they were done, they rinsed their cups in the sink and climbed the stairs together.

They said goodnight and the moment Steph's head hit her pillow she was fast asleep.

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**Thank you to my very loyal reviewers, notably WillowDryad and AquilaTempestas for reviewing both chapters so far.**

**I hope everyone is enjoying the story so far, and remember I am still looking for Narnian OCs for later in this fic and my upcoming fic (dwarves, centaurs, talking animals, anything you have =) ) - just drop me a line in a review or a PM - I check my inbox pretty regularly. **


	4. Into the Wardrobe

**Finding Narnia**

A Chronicles of Narnia Fanfiction by Darkened-Storm

**Disclaimer:** I, Darkened-Storm, own only my plot, ideas and characters. C.S Lewis owns The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Any characters you do not recognise from his series, including Stephanie and Rebecca Pevensie, are my creations.

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**Chapter Four: Into the Wardrobe**

Things improved over the next few days for Lucy. Peter saw to it that Edmund stopped jeering at her and they all made sure not to bring up any talk of the wardrobe so that Lucy eventually stopped talking about it herself. During the days, they walked outside, tried their hand at fishing (they never caught anything) and even played a game or two of cricket.

Peter made good on his promise to teach Steph how to play. She found it quite fun to hit the ball as hard as she could, but she couldn't hit it as far as Edmund, and nowhere near as far as Peter could. Becky and Susan both proved to be quite poor at either of those things, so they took turns as the wicket keeper. Becky was the only one to get Peter out by throwing the ball at the wicket when he was out of the crease.

Lucy began to get more involved as the days went on and her mood seemed to cheer up. Edmund's mood, on the other hand got worse.

"Why can't we play Hide and Seek again?" he asked, looking sour. He hadn't been paying attention when Peter had last bowled and had been hit by the ball himself. Steph knew from catching the ball time and time again that cricket balls were very, very hard and hurt when they hit you.

Peter tossed the ball from his left hand to his right. "I thought you said it was a kids game," he jeered and Edmund pulled a face.

"We could use the fresh air," Susan said pointedly.

"It's not like there isn't any air inside," Edmund grumbled, but no one paid any attention to him.

"Are you ready?" Peter called to his brother. Edmund tapped his bat against the ground and shouted back; "are you?"

Peter bowled again, with perfect form and this time, Edmund swung. A resounding _clunk_ sounded as the ball connected with the bat and both Steph and Becky readied for the catch. The ball flew off in Becky's direction and she jumped for it, but that ball soared far over her head and towards the house.

A moment later there was a _smash_ and the glass window broke, and then a _crash_ and a _bang_ as the furniture inside the house fell. Edmund dropped the bat almost at once. The children looked at each other, knowing they were all in very big trouble.

"Come on," Susan said. "We better go look." They left the cricket bat and the stumps on the grass and went back inside.

"It was the third window on the east side of the house," Steph pointed out and Peter led the way up the stairs. He counted the rooms with windows until they came to the long room with the suit of armour. The armour itself was no longer standing, but was sprawled out on the rug and its helm had rolled across the room. Steph stared in dismay at the suit, wondering if it could be put back together again.

"Well done Ed," Peter told his brother, not at all impressed.

"You bowled it!" Edmund exclaimed, as if that made Peter partly to blame.

"Listen," Becky said, holding up a finger for them to all be quiet. They listened, heard footsteps coming up the stairs and a shrill voice say; "what on earth is going on up there?"

Susan's eyes grew wide in alarm. "The Macready!" she exclaimed.

Forgetting his annoyance at Edmund, Peter grabbed his youngest sister by the arm and beckoned them to follow him. "Come on!"

They raced from the opposite door of the room and down the long hallway and down another flight of stairs before Peter tried a door on their left. As he turned the handle they heard footsteps from the other side of the door and realised that Mrs Macready must have taken the back stairs instead of the front stairs they had expected.

"Run!" Becky exclaimed, and ran up the stairs on the other side. Edmund hastened after her and the rest followed as she led them into the library, though the many shelves and out into a passageway. They thought they may just be in the clear when they heard the footsteps once again from the other side of the door.

They ran through the house, Peter leading once again, ducking through passageways and corridors until he stopped outside the door to the dining room. He hushed all of them and pressed his ear to the door. Sure enough, they heard the pat-pat-pat of footsteps once again.

Impossible, was Steph's only thought. They must have run halfway across the house and she was fairly certain the Macready couldn't run as fast as they could. Someone, or something else must be following them – or some sort of magic in the house had come to life and was chasing them into Narnia.

Shaking his head in disbelief, Peter grinned and said. "She's faster than she looks."

"In here," Steph suggested, and Peter tried the door, the same door Lucy had tried when they had played hide-and-seek. It was still locked, so Edmund rushed to the next door and pushed it open and they all followed him inside before they realised which room it was.

The Wardrobe Room.

"You've got to be joking," said Susan, but Edmund was already pulling the wardrobe door open and beckoning them inside.

"Come on," he said.

No one moved. Steph contemplated running for another room, but the Macready's footsteps could already be heard down the hall. They were sure to be caught if they tried to leave now. Peter seemed to have come to the same decision because he pushed the girls forward and tugged Lucy behind him.

Edmund was already in the wardrobe and Susan helped Lucy into it and Becky went after them. Steph hesitated, wondering if they could all fit inside, but Peter ushered her in then climbed in after her and pulled the door closed behind them - he didn't shut it, because he knew how foolish it was to lock his family inside a wardrobe in a spare room.

It was unsurprisingly squishy inside the wardrobe and Steph tried to move back as far as she could and accidently trod on someone's foot. Becky gave a yelp of alarm and Peter said "shush!" and there was a lot more trodding on toes as Peter ushered them back until they were all pressed up against the back of the wardrobe. Lucy had to sit in Becky's lap so they could all fit. "Do you think she's gone?" she whispered.

"I don't know," said Steph. She was crammed between Peter and Edmund, her back pressed up against Peter's shoulder and Edmund's bony elbow jabbed against her side. She wriggled her arm free and accidently knocked Peter in the chin and he yelped quietly. "Sorry," she muttered.

"It smells horrible in here," Edmund muttered. "Camphor is terrible stuff."

"I expect the pockets of these coats are full of it to keep the moths away," Susan said sullenly from behind them. "And isn't it rather cold in here?"

"Now that you mention it, it _is_ cold," Peter mumbled in agreement, "and hang it all, it's wet too. What's the matter with this place?"

"I'm sitting on something wet!" Becky moaned. "It's getting wetter every minute and it's making me wet! It's disgusting!"

"Come on," Susan said, "let's get out. Surely the Macready's gone by now." They all got to their feet and shuffled forward, trodding on each other as they tried to find their way back to the door.

"Bother, I can't even see the door through all these coats," Steph muttered. It wasn't until then that she noticed her voice had a curious sound – it wasn't muffled by the wardrobe, but rather sounded like it did when she was outdoors.

"Over there," Becky pointed towards the light behind them and they shuffled towards it, except that Steph had the feeling they were going further into the wardrobe than out.

"Edmund!" Susan exclaimed. "That's my foot!"

"I'm not on your toe!" Edmund argued.

Steph received a very hard jab in the back and whirled around to snap at her sister. "Becky, don't poke!"

"Would you stop shoving!" Peter snapped at everyone. He stumbled, lost his balance and brought Susan and Steph down with him.

"Ooff!" Steph muttered as her bottom landed on something that was fortunately soft, but alarmingly cold. And wet. She looked down to find not the wood of the wardrobe, or shoes or coats that one might expect to find in a wardrobe, but something white. "Snow?" she exclaimed.

She looked around and instead of seeing the back of the wardrobe, she saw Lucy's world. A magnificent white forest stretched before them as far their eyes could see. Steph spun around and felt the coats still hanging in the wardrobe behind them – the same wardrobe that had been just a wardrobe when she'd looked inside it the other day.

"Impossible," Susan whispered as she and Peter pushed their way through the trees to get a better look.

Lucy stood a little ways ahead of them, a delightful smile on her face. "Don't worry," she said, "I'm sure it's just your imagination."

Peter, his eyes wide with astonishment, turned to her and said; "I don't suppose saying "We're sorry" would quite cover it?"

"No it wouldn't," Lucy said and she threw a handful of snow that hit her brother in the face, "but that might!"

Peter gasped in shock, his hair and face both wet, then he scooped a handful of snow himself and threw it back at his sister. Then he threw another handful that hit Steph square in the face.

"Whoops!" he said, and very sensibly ducked when Becky threw a handful at him, and Susan joined in. Snow flew this way and that and they all laughed hysterically until one of Susan's snowballs hit Edmund on the shoulder.

"Ow!" he exclaimed. "Stop it!" He didn't look very happy to be inside the wardrobe at all, but nor did he seem as surprised to be in a snow covered forest as they did.

It's almost as if he knew all along that Lucy was telling the truth, Steph thought to herself, and she suddenly understood why Edmund had been so ghastly to Lucy the past few days. He hadn't liked to admit that his younger sister was right and he was wrong.

Peter rounded on him. "You little liar," he said fiercely. "Apologise to Lucy." Edmund hesitated, but Peter pressed him. "Say you're sorry!"

"All right!" Edmund exclaimed, "I'm sorry."

Lucy didn't seem quite so upset anymore, now that they could all see her world for themselves. "That's all right," she said, but then added cheekily; "some little children don't know when to stop pretending," earning a smile from Peter.

Susan shivered in the cold and looked longingly back into the wardrobe. Steph guessed that a world inside a wardrobe was a little too surreal for Susan and the younger girl looked like she'd much rather go back to the house and forget all about it. "Maybe we should go back," she suggested.

"Shouldn't we at least take a look around?" Edmund countered.

Despite the cold, Edmund's option was the more appealing one. The only other option was as Susan said, to go back, and Steph was in no hurry to go back and face the Macready – not when they were all wet from the snow, which would undoubtedly raise more questions than any of them wanted to answer.

Steph looked at her sister. Becky's eyes were bright with excitement and she clearly wanted to explore. In fact, she looked more excited and happier than she'd been since they day their father had left, and Steph had no desire to dampen her sister's spirits – or Lucy's.

"Don't you think Lucy should decide?" Steph suggested to Peter. "This is her world after all? And I think we all owe her a treat for not believing her."

"Agreed," said Peter. "What shall it be, Lu?"

Lucy's face lit up. "I'd like you all to meet Mr Tumnus," she exclaimed.

"Then Mr Tumnus it is," Peter declared, and stepped past Susan, who quickly pointed out that they couldn't go hiking in the snow dressed the way they were.

"No," Peter agreed, fussing with something in the wardrobe, "but I'm sure the Professor won't mind us borrowing these." He returned with six coats, three smaller ones for Edmund, Lucy and Becky and three longer ones for Steph, Susan and himself.

Lucy and Becky pulled theirs' on at once, but Susan was hesitant. "If you think about it _logically_," Peter insisted, "we're not even taking them out of the wardrobe."

No one argued after that (except Edmund, who protested to wearing a girl's coat, but Peter made him put it on anyway). Lucy led the way to Tumnus' house, all the while chatting excitedly, talking about sardines and tea that the faun would make them.

I suppose, Steph thought, that if there really could be a world inside a wardrobe, then it wouldn't be all that much more extraordinary to find a faun in there.

It was a long way to the faun's house through the cold icy snow, and neither Susan or Edmund seemed to enjoy it, but spurred on by Lucy's chatter, and looking forward to tea and cakes themselves (Steph wasn't really looking forward to the sardines), they followed her without complaint.

About ten minutes into their trip, Lucy came to a stop beneath a lamp post. "What's this doing here?" Becky wondered, tapping her fingers against the lamp post and causing tiny flecks of snow to fall from it. The post itself was three times her height and made of solid iron. A tiny flame burned within the lantern.

"Why – it looks exactly like one of the lamp posts in London," Susan declared, drawing closer.

"Do you know – I think it _is_ from London," Steph said. "Only, we have electric lamp posts now. I wonder how it got here." She put her hand on the post and when she did she had got the feeling that it seemed to be very much alive.

"Come on," Lucy said, drawing their attention from the lamp-post. She was growing more excited by the minute and eager to get on. "We're not far now, it's just over those hills."

The wood thinned out just passed the lamppost and as they neared the edge of the forest Steph the hills Lucy had told them about. The ground ahead sloped downwards towards a small valley where she assumed the faun's cave would be.

"Watch you don't fall down," Peter told them sensibly, as he led the way with Lucy. Becky followed happily behind, then Susan and Steph with Edmund grudgingly bringing up the rear.

"Trying to sound like Father again, he is," he mumbled under his breath. "I said from the beginning this was a horrible idea, but none of you listened."

"Oh, do stop grumbling Ed," Steph said, letting the others get a few paces ahead before she went on.

"You can't blame Peter for your behaviour," she told him fairly. "You were the one who lied to us about the Wardrobe, why should we listen to you now?"

"No I don't expect you would - you're all just as bad as each other," Edmund grumbled.

Steph sighed in frustration. "Peter's trying to do the best by all of us, Ed," she told him pointedly. "You'll have a much better time of it if you stopped being so hard on him."

She was pretty sure her words fell on deaf ears – or even if Edmund did listen, he would twist her words around in his head so that she and Peter were once again doing wrong by him. Leaving Edmund to be murky by himself, she struggled through the snow and caught a hold of her sister's hand. On they walked, with the path getting rougher in some places and where there was no snow the ground beneath was cold and slippery and, despite his words, Peter was the first to fall down.

"What was that you said about not falling down, Peter," Becky teased. He tossed a handful of snow at her and she ducked out of the way, giggling.

When Susan fell down only a few minutes later, Steph half expected her to have a fit and demand they all go back home. Instead, Susan laughed and waved her arms in the snow.

"Look, an angel," she declared, pointing at the snow.

"Looks like a fuzzy Christmas tree to me," Peter teased. Susan scowled at her brother and lobbed a handful of snow at him before they continued on, with Lucy still in the lead. She grew more and more excited as they went on, chattering constantly.

"It's just around the corner now," she said. "Mr Tumnas will make us some lovely tea and we'll have lots and lots of…"

She stopped short and gasped. Peter, Susan and Steph both came to a sudden stop behind her. Becky, who hadn't been paying attention walked straight into Peter.

"Ow," she muttered. "Why've we stopped."

"Shh," Steph hissed, bringing a finger to her lips and with the other, pointed at the house in the cave.

The door had been wrenched off its hinges and broken to bits. The entrance was covered in snow that was days old and inside the cave was dark and lifeless and Steph knew at once what had happened. The faun's house had been invaded.

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**Thank you to all my loyal reviewers. Chapter four breaks the 10,000 word mark (hooray!) I am changing my writing schedule to updates fortnightly instead of weekly in order to have some time to write a second Narnia fanfic. As always, thanks for reading this chapter and please leave a nice review. **


	5. The Robin and the Beaver

**Finding Narnia**

A Chronicles of Narnia Fanfiction by Darkened-Storm

**Disclaimer:** I, Darkened-Storm, own only my plot, ideas and characters. C.S Lewis owns The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Any characters you do not recognise from his series, including Stephanie and Rebecca Pevensie, are my creations.

* * *

**Chapter Five: The Robin and the Beaver**

"This is a pretty good wash-out," said Edmund; "not much good coming here."

Steph shot him a reproachful look as she stepped over the entry. The fauns cave was a mess. Broken cups, plates and cutlery littered the kitchen floor. The entire cave had a damp, musty feeling as though no one had lived in it for days. The fireplace had gone out long ago, leaving only charred sticks behind and snow had drifted in from the open doorway and collected in a pile on the floor by the door.

Lucy's eyes were wet with tears as she looked around at the destroyed house; "who would do something like this?" she asked them.

"Maybe this will tell us," Steph said, pointing to a notice she spotted pinned to the wall. It was written on old parchment, the sort used before with quills and ink bottles rather than pens and pencils. Peter pulled the notice from the wall and read it. The colour drained from his face as he read the first few lines and he looked up, catching Steph's gaze. Wordlessly, she crossed the room to his side and read over his shoulder.

"What's it say?" Becky asked, her brown eyes filled with concern as she caught the worried looks the older two were giving each other.

Peter hesitated, then began to read aloud; "The faun, Tumnas, is hereby been charged with high treason against Her Imperial Majesty, Jadis, Queen of Narnia, for comforting her enemies and fraternising with humans, signed Maugrim, Captain of the Secret Police."

He handed the notice to Becky and she read it again and saw that in place of a signature at the bottom of the notice there was a large paw print ink red ink. Susan took the notice from her and glared down at it.

"All right," she said in a sharp tone. "Now we really should go back."

"But what about Mr Tumnus!" Lucy exclaimed.

"If he was arrested just for being with a human, I don't think there's much we can do," Susan answered.

"You don't understand, do you?" Lucy said, looking as though she wanted to cry again. "_I'm_ the human, she must have found out he helped me."

She looked helplessly at Peter, wishing he would say something. Peter bit his lip hesitantly, then said; "maybe we could call the police?"

Susan rolled her eyes. "These _are_ the police," she said, brandishing the notice in her brother's face and earning a dry look from him in return before he turned back to Lucy.

"Don't worry, Lu," Peter assured his sister. "We'll think of something."

"Why?" Edmund said quietly from the corner of the room and they all turned to look at him expectantly. He sighed impatiently. "He's a criminal," he insisted. "Why should we help him?"

"Because he helped Lucy," Steph said quietly, seeing her family's sullen looks. Even Susan was looking dejected now. As much as she hated the snow and the cold and she really wanted to go home, it didn't sit well with her leaving the faun to suffer.

Peter seemed to have come to a decision then, because he turned to Lucy and said; "Lu, tell us about the queen."

"She's not a real queen," Lucy said. "She's a horrible witch that put an enchantment over the forest so that it's always winter and never Christmas."

"Oh please, Peter," Becky said, looking up at him with pleading eyes. "We can't leave the poor faun behind – the Witch might do all sorts of nasty things to him – maybe turn him into a toad, or try to bake him into bread like Hansel and Gretel."

Peter looked indecisive. He looked from Lucy, to Becky and back again, his frown growing deeper each time. Finally, he gave a heavy sigh and looked to Steph. "What do you think?" he asked her.

Steph hesitated, feeling Susan's heated glare on her back. "I don't feel right leaving Mr Tumnus in the hands of the this Witch – she sounds really evil, and I think that if we could help him then we should, because that's the right thing to do but I really wouldn't have a clue how to do it. We'd have to find him first, I suppose, and then break him out of whatever prison he's in – but again, I don't know how we'd do that either."

Peter nodded in agreement; "if only we knew where the poor chap was imprisoned," he said.

Lucy gasped suddenly and pointed to a tree outside the door. They all looked and saw a tiny robin perched on the tree. It saw them looking at it and whistled sharply, then fluttered away out of sight.

"Did that bird just 'psst' us?" Susan asked, looking bewildered.

"Don't be stupid," said Edmund. "It's a bird."

"Yes but, we're in Narnia," Becky said, sounding excited again. "Maybe the birds here can talk to humans, just like the faun."

"Do you think it can lead us to the Witch?" Lucy wondered hopefully.

Steph drew a breath. "Only one way to find out," she said, and led the way out of the faun's cave. The bird had flown down to a lower perch on the next tree. Lucy took a step closer and the bird flittered away to land on the next branch. When she moved closer, it flew again, and again until it was only a few trees away.

"It wants us to follow it," Becky guessed. She turned to Lucy with a smile and held out her hand. "Come on Lu, let's go."

"Wait!" Susan exclaimed, but Lucy had already looped her arm through Becky's and the two girls were hurrying after the bird, which had moved on to the next tree. Shooting a fleeting look at her brothers and Steph, Susan went after them.

"Should we go?" Steph asked Peter curiously.

Peter just shrugged his shoulders. "I don't see that there's much else to do," he said and motioned for her to follow. Edmund huffed crossly and followed after them.

They travelled that way for about an hour, with Lucy, Becky and Susan in front, Steph in the middle and Peter and Edmund bringing up the rear when Edmund said to Peter; "if you're not too high and mighty to talk to me, I've something to say you should listen to."

"I don't know that I should listen to much that you have to say given your record this week," Peter answered coldly.

"Give it a rest, Peter," Steph said. She was cold and hungry and really didn't want to hear any more arguing and most of her anger at Edmund had abated over the course of the past hour. There was no point them being mad at each other now and she figured it would just be better to let Edmund say what he had to say. "What's the matter Edmund?"

"Not so loud!" Edmund said. "I don't want to frighten the others – but have you realised what we're doing?"

"What?" Peter said, lowering his voice.

"We're following a guide we know nothing about, how do we know he's not leading us into a trap," Edmund said.

As much as Steph hated to admit it, she knew Edmund had a point. Still, she wanted to follow the bird because she had a feeling it was the right thing to do. "It's a bird, Ed," she said, trying not to slip in the snow as the ground descended beneath them. "I don't think a bird would lead us into a trap."

"What if it's a bad bird?" Edmund pointed out. "What then?"

Peter frowned. "It's a robin you know. They're good birds in all the stories I've ever read. I'm sure a robin wouldn't be on the wrong side."

"Well which is the right side?" Edmund argued. "Who's to say that the Fauns are right and the Queen – the Witch – is bad? Aren't they each as likely to say that the other one is bad?"

Again, Steph knew he had a point, and she couldn't help but feel annoyed at him for it. Why hadn't he pointed this out earlier, she wondered, before they had trekked another hour into the snow and gotten their feet and clothes soaked. Because none of us would have listened to him, she realised, remembering how Peter him down when he said they shouldn't help the Faun, and she, even before them, had told him time and time again to stop grumbling.

"The Faun saved Lucy," she said at last. "Either way, it doesn't look as though we have much of a choice. We can't remember the way back to the wardrobe, or even that silly lamp post so it's not as simple as turning around and going back."

Peter frowned as he realised their predicament. "Maybe Su was right – we should have turned back earlier."

"Don't tell her that," Edmund muttered. "It'll put her in a horrible mood and none of us will be able to bear it."

Peter gave his brother a reproachful look, but couldn't argue with him. "There's still the problem of the Faun," he mused. Finally, he came to a decision. "All right, we'll keep following and if we see anyone, we'll ask them for directions back to the lamp-post and hope Lucy knows the way home from there."

Up ahead, Lucy gave a gasp as Becky slipped in the snow and landed on her backside. Susan yelled and hurried over to help them. By the time Peter, Edmund and Steph caught up to them and Susan helped Becky to her feet, the Robin was long gone.

"Now what?" Edmund said, giving Peter a look that went as far to telling him 'I told you so,' as he dared.

"Shh!" Becky hissed. "I heard something over there," she said, and pointed to the trees and they all stopped to listen. First they heard a rustling in the trees somewhere to their left and they saw something move.

The girls all crowded behind Peter and he gathered them around him protectively. Lucy, who was the bravest of the lot of them at that moment, walked next to her brother.

Something crawled out from behind a mound of snow. It had a whiskered face and brown fur and a very large tail. It stopped still when it saw them and stood up on its hind legs, sniffing the air.

Lucy was the first to recognise it. "It – it's a beaver."

It approached them on all fours, cautiously sniffing the air as Steph had seen many of them do back home in England. It stopped just short of Peter and twitched its whiskers at them, as though it wanted to say something.

Becky nudged Peter with her foot. "What?" he hissed.

"Go on, see if it's friendly," she urged. Looking as though he'd rather do anything but, Peter inched forward, holding his hand out the way one might approach a stray dog.

"Careful, Peter," Steph said. _Do beavers bite?_ she wondered.

The beaver didn't bite or scratch, but it did something just as alarming – it spoke.

"I ain't going to smell it if that's what you're after."

Steph blinked. Beside her, Becky gave a little cry of alarm and Susan shrank back further. Even Edmund looked astonished. Only Lucy was smiling- she wasn't the least bit surprised to have found a talking Beaver.

Peter, to his credit, managed to looked stunned for only a moment before he pulled his hand away. "Oh, sorry," he said awkwardly. Lucy giggled.

The Beaver inclined his head to her, his whiskers twitching. "Lucy Pevensie?" he enquired.

Lucy grew very still, her smile fading. Letting go of Peter's hand, she took a step closer to the Beaver. "Yes?" Silently, the Beaver reached into his fur and produced a white handkerchief.

"Hey, that's the hanky I gave to Mr –"

"Tumnus," the Beaver said, looking gravely at the white cloth. "He got it to me just before they took him."

Lucy's face fell. "Is he all right?" she asked.

"Further in," he said and he turned and disappeared behind the mound of snow, beckoning for them to follow.

Peter and Lucy immediately began to follow him. Susan hurried after her brother and grabbed his arm. "What are you doing?" she asked, sounding panicked.

"She's right," Edmund said at once, looking alarmed. "How do we know we can trust him?"

Peter looked impatient and motioned towards the Beaver. "He said he knows the faun," he said.

Susan stared at her brother in disbelief. "He's a beaver," she exclaimed, "he shouldn't be _saying _anything?"

"Fauns and witches aren't supposed to exist either," Steph said pointedly, feeling annoyed with Susan. Why did she take every opportunity to point out logic when clearly, this place wasn't very logical at all. Almost immediately she felt bad for snapping at Susan, but she felt that she really wanted to go on. "Look, we've come this far," she said.

The Beaver popped its head out from behind the mound of snow and beckoned to them. "Everything all right?"

"Yes," Peter said hastily. "We were just talking."

The fur above the Beaver's knitted together, and Steph could only guess that he was frowning. "That's better left for safer quarters," he said, and hurried away.

"He means the trees," Lucy explained, looking wearily around. They were surrounded by tall trees, and none of them had noticed until now that they were completely still, even in the wind and Steph had the bizarre feeling that they were watching her and she suddenly wanted to be very far away from them.

_But where are we supposed to go?_ She wondered. Should they follow the Beaver when they didn't know where he might take them, or should they just turn around now and hope they didn't get lost on the way back?

She didn't much like the idea of getting lost – and Lucy trusted the Beaver, and it was clearly an acquaintance of the faun's. _And it's better than trying to find our way back to the wardrobe in the cold when we're all hungry_, Steph decided. "Come on," she said. She took Becky's hand and followed the Beaver.

The Beaver kept a surprisingly quick pace through the forest, darting behind trees and hurrying them along as best he could, eager to get them to a safer place before nightfall. They tried their best, but all the children were feeling exhausted from a whole day of walking about. Even Lucy dragged her feet as she trudged silently beside her oldest brother.

"Come on," the Beaver urged them. "We don't want to be caught out here after nightfall." None of them dared to ask why because it took all of their concentration to keep from falling over in the snow as the ground began to descend beneath them.

Suddenly, the Beaver's expression brightened and he stood up on two feet. "Here we are then," he said proudly. They were standing on the edge of a narrow valley over a frozen river. The Beaver motioned to the dam, indicating it was his. In the middle of the dam was a funny shaped house with a chimney that smoked and Steph suddenly became aware of her stomach grumbling. She was starving!

"It's lovely," Lucy said excitedly.

"It's merely a trifle," Mr Beaver said, but he sounded pleased just the same. "Still plenty to do, ain't quite finished it yet. It'll look the business when it is though."

A second Beaver shuffled out of the tiny house as they drew closer, waving its paws sternly. "Beaver? Is that you?" she said in a high, womanly voice. "I've been worried sick! If I find out you've been out with Badger again - Oh!" she said when she saw them, and clasped her hands to her mouth. "Those aren't Badgers," she said delightedly and waddled over to them. "Oh, I never thought I'd see this day!"

Then she turned around to her husband and hissed; "look at my fur," and immediately began brushing her coat. "You couldn't give me ten minutes warning?"

Mr Beaver chuckled. "I would have given you a week if I thought it would have helped," he told her.

Mrs Beaver rolled her eyes at him before looking up at all of them happily. "Oh, come inside and we'll see if we can't get you some food – and some civilised company," she added, nudging her husband, who chuckled.

Susan, at the mention of dinner and warm food was the first into the little house. "Watch your step," Mr Beaver told them, and Peter helped Lucy over the little step into the house. As soon as they were inside, Mrs Beaver began bustling about, fetching pots and a kettle.

"Get us some fish, Mr Beaver," she said. Peter went with him and the girls helped Mrs Beaver fill the kettle and cut the potatoes into chips and Steph almost felt as though she was at home, helping her mother prepare dinner. She spread a cloth over the table and helped Lucy place the forks and knives on the table and by the time they were done, Peter returned with Mr Beaver and a catch of fish so that they all sat down with a plate and a fork and knife each and began to talk.

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**Sorry for the late update, uni kept me rather busy and I've just booked myself a trip to Sydney to see the Narnia exhibition there! I am going in 11 days, hoorah! Anyway, enjoy the chapter and I will have another update for you soon! Thankyou to all my loyal reviewers.**

**[EDIT] Oh gosh! I want to say a very big sorry to everyone who reviewed the last chapter... for some reason I am no longer getting email alerts to my phone so I didn't see any of the reviews from last chapter until now! I am terribly sorry and will go and reply to all your reviews now. **


	6. What Happened to Tumnus

**Finding Narnia**

A Chronicles of Narnia Fanfiction by Darkened-Storm

**Disclaimer:** I, Darkened-Storm, own only my plot, ideas and characters. C.S Lewis owns The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Any characters you do not recognise from his series, including Stephanie and Rebecca Pevensie, are my creations.

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**Chapter Six: What Happened to Tumnus**

"Isn't there anything we can do to help Tumnus?" Peter asked.

Mr Beaver shook his head, looking grim. "They'll have taken him to the Witch's house," he told them, "and you know what they say." They all shook their heads, because obviously they weren't from this world and couldn't possibly know. Mr Beaver lowered his pipe and said in a low voice; "there's few who go through them gates, who come out again."

Steph shuddered involuntarily and Mrs Beaver bustled over to them with a tray of sliced fish and potato. "Fish and chips," she said loudly. She gave her husband a dirty look as she placed it on the table in front of Lucy. She patted Lucy's arm. "But there is hope dear, lots of hope," she went on, nudging her husband.

Mr Beaver choked on his beer and spat it back into his cup. His wife glared at him and he spluttered. "Oh, there's a right bit more than hope," he said, wiping his mouth on his fur. He looked at them all very cautiously and said in a low voice; "Aslan is on the move."

_Aslan._ The name made Steph feel all funny inside. Not a bad funny, but an excited funny, like the sort of feeling she got when she went outside on the first day of winter and found a beautifully thick layer of snow covering the ground. It was a good feeling, and a safe one and she marvelled at how even though she had never met him, she felt like she knew Aslan.

The look on her sisters face, and on her cousins faces told her they each felt the same – except for maybe Edmund, he looked as though he might be sick again until he shook his head and the look was gone, replaced by the scowl he'd worn since they'd stumbled into Narnia.

"Who's Aslan?" he asked bluntly.

Mr Beaver chuckled and winked at his wife. "Who's Aslan," he repeated, as though Edmund was making a bad joke. "You cheeky little blighter!"

Across the table, Steph caught the frustrated look on Peter's face and Susan's unimpressed pout – Mrs Beaver saw it too and elbowed her husband. Mr Beaver stopped laughing and frowned. "You don't know, do you?"

"Well, we haven't exactly been here very long," Peter told him, still looking rather annoyed.

"But he's only the King of the whole wood, the top geezer – the real King of Narnia." He went on a bit then, talking so fast, much faster than any of the children could keep up with except for maybe Susan, who watched with a deepening frown on her face and Steph caught words like 'Stone Table' and 'prophecy', and she really thought that the Beaver might be a little … strange.

Mr Beaver sighed, his shoulders sagging as he looked at them all. "Look," he said, a little more calmly and began to tick things off on his fingers. "Aslan's return, Tumnus's arrest, the secret police – it's all happening because of you."

"You're blaming us," Susan said, narrowing her eyes at the old Beavers.

"Not blaming," Mrs Beaver said hastily. "Thanking you."

"There's a prophecy," Mr Beaver explained, and lowered his voice once again and they all leaned closer in so that they could hear him. "When Adam's Flesh and Adam's Bone sits at Cair Paravel in throne, the evil time will be over and done."

"You know, that doesn't really rhyme," Susan pointed out. Peter levelled her a look to which she rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, I know it don't," Beaver said, forgetting his grammar in his impatience. "You're kind of missing the point."

Mrs Beaver placed a hand on her husband's shoulder and smiled warmly at them. "It has long foretold that two Sons of Adam and four Daughters of Eve will defeat the White Witch and restore piece to Narnia."

"And you think we're the ones?" Peter asked shakily.

"Well you better be because Aslan's already figured out your army!"

"Our army!" Lucy exclaimed.

"We have an army," Becky said, looking sullen. "Why would we need an army? You're not expecting us to go off to war are you?"

Susan nudged Peter with her elbow and he grimaced. "Mum sent us away so we wouldn't get caught up in a war," she said.

The two Beavers, as lovely as they were, were obviously very, very confused, Steph decided, but they looked so excited and glad to have them here that she didn't think it was kind to tell them otherwise. Susan apparently didn't think so, and she nudged Peter again with her elbow. Obviously, she expected him to say something to the contrary.

Peter looked helplessly at the Beavers. "I think you've made a mistake," he told them. "We're not heroes."

"We're from Finchley!" Susan added. The Beaver's both looked at each other – Mr Beaver shrugged his shoulders and Steph realised that they had about as much of an idea as to where Finchley was as the six of them had about Aslan.

"They don't even know where Finchley is," she said pointedly to Susan.

And that was about as much insanity as Susan could take up to the present moment. She politely folded her napkin up, placed it on the table and got to her feet as if to leave. "Thank you for your hospitality but we really have to go," she said.

Reluctantly, Peter stood up as well and Steph felt him gently prod her in the back as he rose and she hastily followed his example.

"But you can't just leave," Mr Beaver exclaimed.

"He's right," Lucy agreed. "We have to help Mr Tumnus."

"It's out of our hands," Peter said firmly, and Steph recognised the tone he'd used on Lucy the day they had played Hide and Seek and knew it could mean only one thing – Peter had switched back to 'responsible brother' mode. "I'm sorry," he said apologetically to the Beavers, "but it's time the four of us were going home. Ed," he turned around to where Edmund had been sitting on the stairs and stopped in his tracks. "Ed?"

Steph looked around and saw the empty staircase, then to the open door and had a horrible feeling. Edmund was gone. "Edmund?"

Shaking his head, Peter said crossly; "I'm going to kill him."

A dark look crossed Mr Beavers face and he said; "You may not have to."

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**This chapter pretty much came straight from the movie**, hence why I didn't like writing it and why it's very short. I just thought I'd put it up because I'm going away on a **field camp** for 5 days to count frogs as a part of my** Zoology** major and didn't want you to all have to wait until I returned for an update (you will be getting one when I return anyway because I'll have plenty of time between counting frogs to proof read the next chapter).

A special thanks to **HighQueenP, MCH, **and** anniecarrots1** for being awesome and faithful reviewers.


	7. To The Castle

**Finding Narnia**

A Chronicles of Narnia Fanfiction by Darkened-Storm

**Disclaimer:** I, Darkened-Storm, own only my plot, ideas and characters. C.S Lewis owns The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Any characters you do not recognise from his series, including Stephanie and Rebecca Pevensie, are my creations.

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**Chapter Seven: To the Castle**

"Let's split up," Peter said as soon as they'd bundled on their coats and gone outside in search of Edmund. "Search everywhere – we have to find him."

No one argued. Lucy went with Peter, her eyes wet with tears and they went left around the dam calling out to Edmund. Susan went right with Mr Beaver, looking cross but also looking extremely worried for her brother. Steph took Becky's hand and together they went straight, back the way they had come.

The sky was truly dark now and they didn't have a hope of seeing much at all. Steph held onto Becky's hand as tightly as she could so they wouldn't get separated and began to yell Edmund's name. They went all the way to the edge of the dam, Steph half dragging Becky through the layer of new fallen snow until they could both go no further, yelling until their voices were hoarse from the cold and their own fear.

Steph felt horrible. Fear nagged at the corners of her mind and she was beside herself with worry, but worst of all, she felt guilty, horribly guilty for all the nasty things she had said to Edmund earlier - guilty for telling him off and guilty for not listening to him when he said they shouldn't follow the bird.

_Really, it's no wonder he's run off on us,_ she thought, _when we treat him so._ Had Edmund hated them all so much that he'd turned to the White Witch. Were they all such terrible brothers and sisters and cousins that he'd want them turned to stone?

No, Edmund wasn't like that. He could be nasty yes, but really, he was just a child – a child who'd been torn away from his mother and father, sent to live in a country house with a terrible housekeeper and stuck with an older brother who constantly berated him, an overbearing older sister, one cousin who treated him like a child and another who –

Who couldn't stand up for him when she thought something might be wrong, Steph thought bitterly, kicking at the snow. She had known something was wrong with Edmund that night Lucy claimed to have found him in the wardrobe. He'd looked so horribly pale and cold – he must have met the White Witch on his first journey in to Narnia.

If he'd met her all alone in the forest, who knows what the White Witch might have said to him to turn him against his family. She wouldn't need to say much, with Edmund already being so mad at them all. And once she had Edmund, what would the Witch do to him when she found out he was one of the prophesied Sons of Adam?

"Edmund!" she called. "Ed! Where are you!"

"It's no use," Becky said from beside her. Her teeth were chattering and she hugged her coat more tightly around her. "Mr Beaver's right – he's gone to the Witch. Stupid, stupid Edmund."

"Don't say that," Steph exclaimed, rounding on her sister furiously. "Don't you understand, Edmund could be in real trouble! The Witch might even turn him to stone!"

Almost immediately she knew she had spoken too harshly. Becky's brown eyes widened and her lips trembled. She didn't like Edmund a whole lot, but he was still family and she didn't want anything bad to happen to him.

"I'm sorry," Steph said at once. "Really, but Ed's in trouble now and we can't just leave him behind because we think he's not very nice – and it's because we were so horrible to him that he's gone and done this."

And she knew Becky felt horribly guilty, because while Steph and Peter and Susan had tried their best to diffuse Edmund when he was nasty, she had constantly teased and belittled him. "Do you – do you think she'd really turn him to stone?" she asked, her voice wavering.

Steph shivered. "I don't know, maybe – if she's really as evil as the Beaver says – " She broke off when she heard Lucy yell from the other side of the house. "Hurry," she said to Becky, and despite their tired limbs they ran the entire way back to the little house where Peter, Susan, Lucy and Mr Beaver were waiting.

"Footprints!" Lucy exclaimed, pointing to the snow. A set of small footprints that could only have belonged to Edmund led up a slope towards two hills in the distance.

"The Witch's castle is that way," Mr Beaver told them. "We haven't much time." And he ran, dropping onto all fours to climb the slope. They hurried after him, struggling with their oversized coats and slippery shoes.

It was colder now – horribly cold as they climbed, the snow soaking through Peter's trousers and the girls' socks before they'd even made it halfway. "Hurry," Peter called to them, racing ahead, and Steph, Susan, Becky and Lucy scrambled after him. What they saw when they reached the top of the hill made their blood run cold.

A mile below them, at the foot of the valley stretched a lake, frozen lake, much larger than the one the Beaver's house had been built at and in the very centre of the lake stood a terrible looking castle – with little towers with pointed spires as sharp as needles and large stone gates guarding the entry – and walking towards the horrible, tall stone gates, his body trembling with every step that he took, was…

"Edmund!" Lucy screamed. Peter rushed forward.

"No!" Mr Beaver exclaimed, leaping forward and pulling Peter back by the hand, but Peter was much taller and much stronger than him and he dragged the poor old beaver half a meter through the snow before he stopped.

"Get off me," Peter snapped, trying to shake the old Beaver off.

"You're playing into her hands," Mr Beaver exclaimed, digging his claws into the snow so that Peter couldn't take off again.

"Well, we can't just let him go," Susan exclaimed.

"He's our brother," Lucy added.

Mr Beaver shook his head violently and slapped his tail against the snow anxiously. "He's the bait," he told them. "The witch wants all four of you."

"Why?" Peter asked.

"To stop the prophecy from coming true," the Beaver explained, lowering his voice to little more than a whisper. "To kill ya!"

Helplessly, they watched as the Edmund disappeared into behind the big, stone doors.

Susan suddenly looked furious as she marched up to Peter. "This is all your fault," she yelled.

Peter whirled around to face his sister. "My fault?" he exclaimed furiously.

"None of this would have happened if you had just listened to me in the first place," Susan said, raising her voice and causing Mr Beaver to shush them all again.

"Oh, so you knew this would happen?" Peter asked her in a mocking tone – the same tone Edmund had used when he'd accused Susan of trying to be a grown up.

The tone had just the affect he'd intended – it made Susan even angrier. "I didn't know what would happen," Susan answered and she was so furious that began yelling again. "Which is why we should have left while we still could."

"And gone where?" Steph said abruptly, suddenly feeling very angry with Susan for constantly badgering them about going home. Of course, now it was painfully obvious that she'd been right all along and now she was acting as though she was better than all of them because she was right – just as Edmund had said she would.

"Stop it!" Lucy shouted, putting herself between the three of them and glaring at them all. "This isn't going to help Edmund," she exclaimed.

Dread filled Steph from head to toe and she knew Lucy was right – if they went after Edmund now the witch would only capture them and most likely turn them all to stone, but if they didn't go, would she keep Edmund alive? Surely they'd be no good killing him when she could still use him to lure the rest of them to her.

_Unless she decides the best way to prevent the prophecy from coming true is to just kill Edmund now_, Steph thought, _and then they'd only be five of us at Cair Paravel._

"Will she kill Edmund?" she asked the Beaver, unable to keep her voice from shaking.

Mr Beaver shook his head. "No, most likely she'll keep him alive so long as he's the only one she's got. Only Aslan can help your brother now."

"Then take us to him," Peter said.

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**I had this chapter ready a while ago, but I didn't feel like updating because I only got one review. I'll update faster this time if I get more reviews. **


	8. The Wolves

**Finding Narnia**

A Chronicles of Narnia Fanfiction by Darkened-Storm

**Disclaimer:** I, Darkened-Storm, own only my plot, ideas and characters. C.S Lewis owns The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Any characters you do not recognise from his series, including Stephanie and Rebecca Pevensie, are my creations.

**Note: I sincerely apologise for the lack if updates this month - it was my last month of uni and there were so many assignments due. I took a break to finish this at last!**

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**Chapter Eight: The Wolves!**

"Hurry mother! They're after us!" Mr Beaver bellowed, pushing through the door into the little house. Mrs Beaver was standing in the kitchen waiting. When she saw them barge through the door she clasped her paws together and hurried to the kitchen cupboard.

"What's she doing?" Peter asked incredulously, but Mr Beaver could only throw his paws up in the air and shrug.

"Oh, you'll be thanking me later," Mrs Beaver said and she gathered up some loaves of bread and loaded them onto the tiny kitchen table. Susan and Becky ran to help her, loading everything Mrs Beaver laid out into seven bags, three of them a great deal smaller than the rest. "It's a long journey and Beaver gets pretty cranky when he's hungry."

"I'm cranky now!" Mr Beaver exclaimed, waving his hands again, but Mrs Beaver just ignored him and continued to fuss about and a loud howl echoed outside the little house.

"What was that?" Becky asked, shivering.

"The Wolves," Mr Beaver said. "They're her secret police. We have to get into the tunnels before they find us." He crossed the room and slapped at the floor with his tail. The wood shuddered, revealing a secret door.

Susan rushed to help Mrs Beaver in the kitchen. "Do you think we'll need jam?" she asked.

Peter stared at her incredulously. "Only if the witch serves toast!" he exclaimed.

Susan shot him a furious look but a loud growl from outside the house cut her off before she could retort.

"They're getting closer," Becky exclaimed, wringing her hands. "Oh can we go now?"

Mrs Beaver finished packing and handed each of them a bag, saving the smallest for Lucy. Steph slung her bag over her shoulder and helped Becky with hers. Mr Beaver ushered them all towards the wall of the house.

Mrs Beaver paused, looking around her home one last time. "I suppose the sewing machine's too heavy to bring?"

"Yes. It is," said Mr Beaver, crossing his paws over his chest. "A great deal too heavy!"

"Oh, come on," Steph said anxiously. She could hear the wolves scrambling about outside the little house, their paws scratching on the wooden logs. They'd be trapped if they didn't escape now!

"In here," Beaver told them, and he pulled open the secret door in the floor of the little house. "Grab the torches, it's dark down here." Peter thrust oil lanterns into Steph and Susan's hands and took a long wooden torch which he lit the end of for himself.

They bundled through the door and hurried through the tunnel in single file. Mr Beaver went first, and Peter went after him. Steph and Becky went next, then Susan and Lucy while Mrs Beaver brought up the rear. It was a difficult trek – the tunnel was small and Peter had to lean his head forward so that he didn't knock it on the roof of the tunnel.

"Badger and me dug this," Mr Beaver told them as he ran. "It comes out right near his place."

"You told me it lead to your Mum's," Mrs Beaver scolded from behind them and if it had been any other time (particularly when they weren't being chased by a pack of wolves) Steph would have laughed at the banter between the two, but as it was, she needed all her energy to run through the tunnel.

She had no trouble keeping up with Peter because she didn't have to crouch half as much as he did but it was still difficult trying to run and duck under a low roof at the same time. Only Lucy could stand upright, and even then she was hampered by the odd tree root that tripped her up.

"Lucy!" Susan exclaimed when Lucy tumbled to the floor.

"Shh!" Becky hissed, holding up her hand so they could all hear the barking in the distance. It wasn't muffled now.

"They're in the tunnel," Lucy whispered.

"Quick, this way," said Mr Beaver.

"Move," Steph urged her sister along. The Beavers were far ahead now – they could move much faster on four legs in the tunnel than they could but Peter kept close behind, shouting to the girls to run. They ran faster, bumping their heads on the low ceiling. They stopped when they came to a fork in the tunnel. Mr Beaver looked left and right and Steph had the horrible feeling he was lost.

"You should have brought a map," his wife told him.

"There wasn't room next to the jam," Mr Beaver replied and chose left. They all scrambled after him until they reached what Steph thought was a dead end except that Mr Beaver pushed aside the dirt and clambered out of a small hole into the open.

"Go," Peter instructed them, pushing Becky through next and Steph after her.

"Peter," Steph exclaimed when he didn't follow after her. Why was he stopping?

"Just go," he yelled to her, ushering his sisters after her. "Take them and go." Then she lost sight of him as Susan crawled through the hole, pulling her sister behind and telling her to hurry. Then Peter climbed out at last, without his torch, and help Mr Beaver roll a large barrel in front of the hole.

The sounds of the wolves died away the moment the entrance was covered and they all stumbled away. Steph collapsed in the snow, too tired to care that it was freezing and felt Becky sink into the snow beside her. The muscles in Steph's legs ached from running and her neck and back hurt from having to crouch for so long in the Beaver's House and then in the tunnel.

Becky was squeezing her hand so tightly, Steph was starting to lose feeling in her fingers. She made to wriggle her fingers free, but Becky pointed to something in the snow. "Look," she whispered, her voice trembling.

They were standing in the middle of a small cluster of houses, each of them about the size of the Beavers' Lodge and, like Mr Tumnus's cave they were all dark and long abandoned – only statues of animals remained behind. Steph took a step closer to the nearest one, a pig that was as tall as her chest.

_They're Narnians_, she realised, a horrible feeling in stomach.

Peter was the first to find his voice. He turned to Mr Beaver and asked; "What happened here?"

"This is what becomes of those who cross the Witch," a new voice spoke from behind them and they all looked around to see a red fox standing on one of the smallest houses.

Lucy gave a start of surprise and Becky screamed, clutching Steph's hand again and Peter instinctively drew them all behind him and splayed his hands out in front of them protectively. Mr Beaver lunged forward and they all thought he was about to take the Fox except that Mrs Beaver grabbed him and heaved him back.

The fox smiled and leap down from the roof. "Relax," he said with a nervous chuckle. "I'm one of the good guys."

Mr Beaver didn't lower his paws. "You look an awful lot like one of the bad ones."

The fox sighed. "An unfortunate family resemblance," he admitted reluctantly, "but we can argue breeding later. Right now, we've got to move."

Peter lowered his hands. "What did you have in mind?"

The fox grinned, please with his answer and lifted a paw to point up. At first Steph thought he meant for them to hide on top of the houses as the fox had done, which wouldn't hide them well at all, but then she realised that he was looking even higher than that, up into the large oak tree that stood behind them, stretching high into the sky.

"You want us the climb the tree?" she guessed.

"You'll never outrun them," the fox told her. "You're going to have to hide. Climb up, all the way up to the top and stay very quiet."

They did as he suggested and Peter gave Susan, Lucy and Becky a boost up into the tree. When Becky was halfway to the third branch, Steph made to follow but stopped when she remembered the fox and looked around.

He wasn't following them. "Aren't you coming?" she asked him. He shook his head.

"Foxes can't climb trees," he told her. "Fortunately, Wolves can't either but some of them will try to claw you down while the rest fetch the Witch. I'll lead them astray – it's your only chance."

Steph thought then that the Fox had to either be lying to them, or he was just a martyr. She decided on the latter, since really, they were out of options. She let Peter give her a boost up so that she could reach the lowest branch and began to climb.

It was tough work. The bark was rough beneath her fingers and she felt a dozen splinters press into her hands before she'd climb passed the second branch.

"Go, King Peter," she heard the Fox say and then Peter was climbing after her. He was better at climbing and caught up to her by the time she reached the third branch. Susan, Becky and Lucy had stopped just above them.

"Higher," Mr Beaver hissed, and they had only just clambered onto the tallest branch when the Wolves burst through the tunnel opening, and surrounded the Fox, snarling and snapping. There were seven of them, all much larger than the biggest dog Steph had ever seen.

"Maugrim," Mr Beaver hissed quietly, and he pointed his paw at the largest wolf. Steph peered over a tree branch to get a better look, but she couldn't hear what they were saying above all the snarls, but she knew whatever they were saying wasn't good for the fox.

The Fox gave a dog-like yelp as the second largest Wolf clamped its jaws around his middle. Lucy gasped and Becky hid her face in Steph's coat so she didn't see.

"Where are the fugatives?" Maugrim snarled.

The fox raised his head with a whimper. "North," he said, loud enough for them to hear from the treetop. "They went north."

"Smell them out," Maugrim barked.


	9. Chapter 9

**Finding Narnia**

A Chronicles of Narnia Fanfiction by Darkened-Storm

**Disclaimer:** I, Darkened-Storm, own only my plot, ideas and characters. C.S Lewis owns The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Any characters you do not recognise from his series, including Stephanie and Rebecca Pevensie, are my creations.

**Author's Note:**

**3 week hiatus!**

Sorry guys, but it's exam period so I'm taking a small hiatus from all things fanfiction related. But to tide you over, I have a few snippets of the next chapters.

* * *

_They sat in silence for a long while after Giles left. He was headed to the Shuddering Wood, he'd told them, when some of Aslan's followers had gathered. He didn't try to persuade them to change their mind, but the look he gave them as he bid them all goodbye was enough to make them all feel horrible for disappointing him – except Susan, who was adamant they would be fighting no war._

_"Really – we should help," Lucy argued, but she didn't sound as sure of herself as she had back at the Beaver's house. "If only because we have to save Edmund and Mr Tumnus."_

_"I've had enough of wars back home," Susan snapped, reiterating her earlier statement. "I'm not getting caught up in one here. I just want to get Edmund back and go home."_

_"But what if we can't get Edmund back without fighting the Witch?" Becky asked quietly._

_"Now, now dears," Mrs Beaver interrupted, resting a paw on Lucy's knee. "There's no use arguing about this now. _

_"But –" Mr Beaver began, but she shushed him with a wave of her paw. _

* * *

Also, thanks to** Elecktrum**. She came up with the name Giles, for the fox, since he wasn't named in the movie and let me use it. I highly recommend reading her fanfics they're as good as the original books!


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